A Little Something For Momma Condor

The Finished Product

            The air is full of love for the mothers of the world and I feel like I would be remiss if I didn’t send some love out to my mom as it is both Mother’s day and my Mom’s birthday. So a little bit about my mom: she managed to raise a pain in the ass kid, that would be me, and play the dual role of mom and dad. She taught me a lot including the basics of how to cook but a crazy love for the greatness of true rock and roll. She likes her music classic and she likes it loud. When my mom was a kid my uncle John teased her that one could hear her music three towns away. I grew up with the sounds of Deep Purple, The Who, and AC DC ringing through our home. I knew all the words to “Won’t Get Fooled Again” by the age of five. Truly my Mom and I were a family who got the Led out. She is the major reason that all of my postings have some form of music in them. So for the love of music that she instilled in me I say thanks. And this one is for you Mom. All My love.

            I feel as though I need to send a little love out to my grandmothers in this post as well. For as much as I was pushed, lovingly, into the kitchen by my mom I spent most of my youth getting kicked out of them by my grandmothers. Always lovingly, these ladies ruled the kitchen of my youth with an iron fist. You did not mess with their area. Sneaking a premature taste of something that was not ready got you a smack across the ass with a wooden spoon. So I will thank them for teaching me what little patience I have. I can hear them laughing at me every time I burn my tongue.

            On to the food now, my mom always ended up with the sort end of the stick when it came to my Grand baking pies. My Gramps loved lemon and apple, I favored cherry and my poor mom loved strawberry and rhubarb. She very rarely got her favorite. Growing up in the Okanagan Valley we have fresh apples and cherries every summer. Gramps' lemon came from a box so my sweet mom was left out in the cold when it came to pies. So, in an attempt to remedy this oversight in pastry, here is my Mom’s favorite kind of pie, made with love for her birthday.

Strawberry and Rhubarb Pie to the tune of “Whole Lotta Love” by Led Zeppelin

Quick short crust pastry

This is enough for one large and one small pie.

3 ½ cups flour

1 cup icing sugar

1cup + 2 tbsp cold cubed butter

2 large eggs

2 tsp vanilla

Splash of milk

Pinch of salt

-Throw the butter, flour, salt and sugar onto a big mixing bowl and crumble the butter with your fingers until the mixture looks like breadcrumbs.

-Add in your wet ingredients and gently bring the mix together. Do not over work it. There is no need to knead. When the mix is a smooth solid mass wrap in cling film and refrigerate for no less than a half an hour, overnight is better. Roll out the dough  and line a pie plate then roll out a lid.

-Now you have your pastry. This recipe works for any and all fruit pies and it is delish.

Filling

1-1  ½ lbs strawberries quartered

1 lb fresh rhubarb sliced

½ +½ cup sugar

1 egg whisked

-Toss the rhubarb and ½ cup of sugar into a large sauté pan over medium heat and let it cook until the rhubarb is al dente about 10-15 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.

-Mix together the rhubarb, strawberries and the remaining sugar.

-Dump the filling into the pie shell. Paint the edges with the egg wash. Top with the lid and crimp together with the bottom shell. Paint the lid with the egg wash, sprinkle with a little sugar and poke some holes in the lid with a knife.

-Bake in a 350 degree oven for 60-65 minutes until the pastry is golden brown. Let cool and serve with some vanilla ice cream.

Happy Birthday Momma, I love you tons.

  

Black and White Red Snapper

            Here we go with a little recipe for Red Snapper. One of the many things that I love is to get my hands on some good fresh fish so when my eyes fell on fresh Snapper in the seafood case a smile broke loose on my face. There is something wonderful about a simple preparation of a nice piece of fish. So here my take on Snapper in a white wine sauce, I served it on top of a bed of, what I call black noodles. It is sort of a fusion thing but I thought the flavours were great together. You get sort of a rosé sort of vibe from the white and red wines. I thought it turned out pretty well so here it is.

Black and White Red Snapper to the tune of Simple Song by the Shins

The Snapper Part

1 fillet of Red Snapper portioned

Salt and pepper

¼ cup white wine

Splash of heavy cream

Juice of 1 lemon

1 tbsp oil

-Season your fish on both sides while you heat oil in a frying pan over medium high heat. Place your fish in the pan fry until you can see the doneness move to about half way up the side, flip and let cook through. Remove the fish and let it rest

-return the pan to the heat and add your wine and lemon and reduce a little. Add in your cream and heat through. Pour the sauce over the fish when you are plating. The Snapper part is done.

The Black Noodle Part

1 Package of Udon or Shanghai style noodles

A handful of thinly sliced red cabbage

¼ cup of red wine

A good splash of soy sauce

A splash of water

-In a large frying pan over medium high heat toss all of your ingredients in and cover with a lid. Move them around from time to time until the noodles separate and that is how you do that.

            I hope you dig the attempt at a little fusion cooking. When I made it I dug it so give it a go and enjoy it.

Repurposing a Bunch of Brisket

            A question that is posed to me quite often is, “what the heck do I do with leftovers?” It just so happens that I was left with a bunch of leftover brisket after the Yukon Blonde show and I thought to myself I could do a bunch of fun stuff with what was left in my fridge. So this post is all about clearing out the fridge and not letting that food go to waste. These are a couple of super quick and easy ways of repurposing whatever you have hanging around. These recipes are also fairly versatile so you can use whatever is left over.

            The first thing I seem to gravitate towards when confronted with stacks of containers that are clogging up my fridge is omelettes. Super easy and quick omelettes are a great any time of day and will fill you up in no time. The other great thing about them is that you can put whatever you want into them and they will come out great. So here is a my quick and easy omelette recipe using some left over brisket.

Brisket Omelette to the tune of U.F.O by Coldplay

3 eggs

Splash of milk

1 clove of garlic minced

½ an onion diced

3-4 mushrooms sliced

Some diced brisket, however much you can fit into the thing

Salt and pepper

-In a small frying pan sauté your garlic, onions, brisket, and mushrooms over medium heat.

-While that is working crack your eggs into a bowl and your milk and whisk them vigorously. What you want here is a complete, or as complete as you can get emulsification of the white, yolk and milk.

-Add in your egg mixture to pan and move everything around until the eggs are about 90% done, cover with a lid for about 30 seconds to finish the cooking, remove from the heat and fold the omelette onto a plate. Done.

            The next little trick is a snack that I made when the boys came over for a poker game: a very simple quesadilla that takes 15 minutes to prepare from fridge to table.

Brisket Quesadilla to the tune of Wednesday Morning by Slackstring

Leftover brisket cut into small chunks

Salt and pepper

1 tsp Chilli powder

 ½ tsp ground cumin

¼ cup of beer

2 cups of grated cheese

4 flour tortillas

-In a frying pan sauté brisket and spices in the beer until the meat is nicely coated with a gooey sauce.

-place half of your grated cheese onto two of the tortillas add your meat on top of the cheese, and then the rest of your cheese on top of the meat. Top with the remaining two tortillas and fire it into a 400 degree oven until the cheese is all gooey and good.

So easy and now you have room in your  fridge for the next round of food. Give these a go and enjoy.

A Menu for Yukon Blonde

            I do get excited about a great many things not the least of which is reconnecting with old friends. I had the opportunity to do so in the past week as some good friends of mine rolled into town. After a crazy couple of months which saw them take Europe by storm, release their new album, and tour across Canada, the boys from Yukon Blonde hit town. Now here comes the rave. This will be a bit biased but I don’t care because this is my blog. You need to see this band; you need to support them, full stop. Their new album, Tiger Talk is, simply put, awesome. In addition to being a wicked band that is bringing back the rock and roll into our lives, they may be the nicest guys out in the world today. Proof positive is the fact that they went out and signed autographs for a bunch of kids who were too young to get into the show. Now here comes a bit of an apology to John, the bass player. John joined the band a little late in the history of me knowing the boys and I don’t know him really well or at all really, but I will say Thank you John for those sweet bass riffs. So here are the recipes that were inspired by the boys I know in Yukon Blonde and their visit to my town. I hope you enjoy and go and buy the album because even if the recipes fail you will have great tunes to enjoy.

Braised Beef Brisket for Jeff Innes to the tune of Guns by Yukon Blonde

5-8lbs of beef brisket

Salt and pepper

4 tbsp onion powder

2 tbsp chilli powder

2 cans of lighter beer

1 liter beef stock

3 coarsely chopped onions

4 cloves of garlic whole

-Combine the salt, pepper, onion powder, and chilli powder. Rub the brisket down with the stuff and chuck it in the fridge over night.

The rub down before the sear

-Sear off the brisket on all sides to a golden brown.

-In a roasting pan toss in your onions, garlic, and brisket. Add in your beer and stock and then cover with foil.

-Toss it into a preheated 300 degree oven and let it work for about 6-7 hours. Let rest for 30 minutes before slicing. Serve on a roll.

That one is for you Jeff now you got your brisket done. Now, we move on to the sauce. The sauce goes out to the member of the band that I know the best Brandon Scott. We played music together but more than that we drank together... a lot. Brandon is known, in my world, as the Bear which is a long story but never fails to make me smile. So the sauce is inspired by Brandon.

Bourbon Barbeque Sauce for Brandon “The Bear” Scott to the tune of My Girl by Yukon Blonde

Saucy just like the Bear

2 cups ketchup

2 tbsp grainy mustard

2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

2tbsp molasses

¼ cup bourbon

2 tbsp brown sugar

1 onion chopped as fine as you can get them

-sweat the onions down in a frying pan until they are super soft but not browned, medium heat lots of stirring.

-dump the rest of the ingredients into a sauce pan and add in the onions and let reduce until it is nice and thick like the stuff you get in the bottle.

-blend the snot out of it and you got your sauce.

There is the Bear’s sauce. Now we move on to the rhythm of the group. I am talking about the man, the myth, the legend... Graham Jones. This is the only recipe in this set that has a little bit of crunch which seems like it is appropriate for the sweet beats of Graham.

Raw slaw for Graham Jones to the tune of Radio by Yukon Blonde

Slaw

½ sliced green cabbage

¼ sliced red cabbage

2 granny smith apples cut into batons

3 grated carrots

Dressing

¼ cup olive oil

¼ cup apple cider vinegar

Salt and pepper

1 tbsp mustard

2 tbsp sour cream

-dump all the veggies into a big bowl.

-in a jar add in all of your dressing ingredients, put on the lid and shake it like your momma gave it to you

-dump the dressing onto the veggies and toss. Now you got the raw slaw.

There you have the menu inspired by the boys in Yukon Blonde. Give it a go and buy Tiger Talk you can’t make the food without the tunes. All the best to Brandon, Jeff, Graham, and John, I can’t wait until we meet again.

Johnny's Hangover Hash

            So I was asked by my friend Jill what were some good ways of re-purposing leftovers and as I thought about it I realized that it is not something that I do very often. I generally just grab the containers out of the fridge, give them a quick smell to make sure that they are still good and simply mow down. The more I thought about it the more I wanted to put together a recipe which allowed us to both use up the leftovers and not waste them and to make something that is fast and easy to satisfy that after work, I am starving, but I am lazy feeling that we all fall victim to. I have another motive for including this recipe and that is it is the best food in world to quell a hangover. Yep that is right you have all of the stuff that you need to get over the over. It is buttery and cheesy and meaty and good. You can and should use whatever you have in your fridge, this is one of those of fluid recipes that you just add what you have. So add what you have. You can make it full of meat or completely meatless the world is your oyster on this one kids.

Johnny’s Hangover Cure Hash

2 potatoes diced

½ onion finely diced

2 tbsp oil

Salt and pepper

Diced corned beef as much as you like or whatever you have in your fridge (in the picture I used leftover pork tureen courtesy of Toby)

 3 eggs beaten with 2 tbsp of milk

Cheese grated whatever you have on hand

2 tbsp Sriracha I love spice so I put more than this in mine, just saying

-Heat oil in a frying pan and add onion and potatoes. Fry until about half way cooked.

-Add in your meat and continue to cook until your spuds are done. Taste them to make sure.

-Add in your eggs and cheese and sriracha and stir to combine with the rest of your ingredients. Keep stirring until your eggs are scrambled the way that you like them.

-Dump the mess onto a plate and devour. Done.